"Chevalier" in the French nobility

Contents

Introduction

The word "chevalier" originally means "knight," that is, horse-riding warrior
(from Latin caballus, horse). It came to take a number of different
meanings that are easily confused.

"Chevalier" as grade of nobility

Originally, knighthood was an induction into a body of professional soldiers,
trained in specialized combat and bound by certain rules of conduct. THe
first stage of apprenticeship led to the status of "ecuyer" or esquire,
after which one could become a knight after a particular ceremony,
whose details varied.

By the time knights ceased to be an effective part of warfare in the 16th c.,
the ceremony had ceased to be practiced, and
the term had become honorary. What exactly it meant, and who could use it,
is a little unclear.
An ordonnance of 1629 prohibited
anyone from using the style of knight "who have not received it from our
predecessors or ourselves, or who do not deserve it by the eminence of
their quality" ("deffendons à tous non-Nobles d'en prendre la qualité,
de se dire Escuyers, ny porter Armoiries timbrées; & à
toutes personnes de prendre la qualité de Chevalier, s'ils ne l'ont
obtenuë de nos predecesseurs ou de Nous, ou que l'eminence de leur
qualité ne la leur attribuë").
In the mid-18th century, Diderot's Encyclopédie
defined the term as "signifie proprement une personne élevée ou par
dignité ou par attribution au-dessus du rang de gentilhomme" (s.v.
chevalier), and lists as first privilege of the nobility
"à pouvoir prendre la qualité d'écuyer ou de chevalier, selon que leur
noblesse est plus ou moins qualifiée, & à communiquer les mêmes
qualités & les privileges qui y sont attachés à leurs femmes quoique
roturieres, & à leurs enfans & autres descendans mâles & femelles" (s.v.
noblesse).
It also defines "noblesse de chevalerie"as "celle qui provient de la qualité
de chevalier, attribuée à quelqu'un ou à ses ancêtres, en lui
donnant l'accolade" (s.v. noblesse de chevalerie).

Jurists differed on whether the style was hereditary. La Roque
(Traité de la Noblesse, 1678; p. 344) thought not: "c'est un abus que
de faire deux degrés de Noblesse, l'un de Chevalier, l'autre d'Ecuyer:
et la Chevalerie ne vient point de la naissance, mais dépend absolument
de la grace du Prince." For him, the title was ad personam and could
only be granted by the king, either by ceremony or through the grant of
"lettres de chevalerie", for which Lar Roque provides examples from 1315.

"Chevalier" as member of an order of knighthood

Chevalier was also a title attached to members of the orders of knighthood:
these were, of course, purely ad personam. Note, however, that by an edict
of 1750, three consecutive generations of officers who were recipients
of the order of Saint-Louis and who met certain requirements on duration of service
endowed the issue of the 3d member with hereditary nobility (but not knighthood;
see more details).
This feature was recalled in an ordonnance of 1814 discussed
below.

No French order of knighthood conferred nobility per se, so these knights were not noble.

"Chevalier" as title

Generally speaking, "chevalier" was not a French title of nobility. There
are, however, a number of exceptions. The first one dates to the time of
Louis XIV. The second exception, the most complex, dates to the time of
Napoleon and the Restoration. Much of what follows comes from Alain
Texier: Qu'est-ce que la noblesse? Paris: 1987, Tallandier. pp.
357-372.

"Chevalier" under the Old Regime

Traditionally, chevalier was not a title of nobility in France. It was,
however, in certain French-speaking countries neighboring France, in particular
in Franche-Comté and Flanders, both under Burgundian and later Spanish
domination. Paul Janssens (Evolution de la noblesse belge depuis la
fin du moyen âge. Brussels: 1998, Crédit Communal).
Initially prized as marking, as in France, ancient nobility, it was bestowed
freely to newly ennobled in the 17th c. The bulk of the grants were
made between 1600 and 1660. Janssens says (p. 386) there were 8 conferrals
of "lettres de chevalerie" from 1401 (really from Charles V) to 1587, 1170
from 1588 to 1709, and 144 from 1710 to 1794. Of those, 218 were
made in the provinces that were annexed by France in the late 17th century
(Artois, the Lille-Douai-Orchies parts of Flanders, the Tournaisis part
of Hainault, and Franche-Comté). However, until 1765 all titles
of chevalier granted in the Netherlands were ad personam.
It was only under Austrian rule that the title was granted to all descendants
in male line (male and female!), as in the Holy Roman Empire.

Louis XIV gained parts of Flanders in 1668 and Franche-Comté
in 1678; he continued the practice of issuing lettres de chevalerie
(although La Roque (Traité de la Noblesse, 1734, p. 69) cites
(French?) examples from 1315 to 1605). Bouly de Lesdain, in
Intermédiaire
des Chercheurs et des Curieux, Nov. 1965, col. 1043, cites creations
by Louis XIV in 1660 in Artois, 1669-71 in French Flanders and Hainault.
More importantly, in November 1702, at the onset of the War of Spanish
Succession, Louis XIV promulgated an edict creating 200 hereditary titles
of chevalier, which could be obtained for a fee by any untitled member
of the nobility of Flanders, Artois, and Hainault. The title was transmissible
to all male descendants of the grantee. Not all letters had
been sold by 1789. See the text of one such letter
below.

These titles are highly unusual, in part because of their explicit geographical
limitation. They are also a departure from the normal forms for titles
in pre-1789 France, because the title didn't seem to be attached
to land: no fiefs were raised to a "chevalerie". That is not the
only such departure, as the king had started granting purely nominal hereditary
titles (such as marquis).

The case of Chambge de Liessart

Séraphin du Chambge, a resident of Flanders, received the title
of chevalier ad personam from Philip IV of Spain on 6 Oct 1662 (Janssens).
He became French with the treaty of Aix-la-Chapelle in 1668. He received
letters confirming his nobility from Louis XIV on 1 October 1673, a requirement
in order to enjoy the status of noble in France after the annexation of
their home-town. But he received separate letters patent or "lettres de
chevalerie", on 29 Oct 1673, conferring on him the title of "chevalier".
These letters were issued by Louis XIV, and are therefore a French title.

That the family became part of the French nobility is without doubt.
They appear in Jougla de Morenas, Woëlmont de Brumagne and even Saint-Simon
and Séréville, even though they are extinct since 1872 according
to Woëlmont de Brumagne. Four members of the family showed up when
the nobility of Flanders was called to elect its representatives for the
Estates General of 1789. Two of them (Pierre-Ernest-Joseph, seigneur de
Noyelles and Charles-Louis-Philippe, seigneur de Douay) are styled "chevalier"
in the rolls (La Roque & Barthélémy: Liste des Gentilhommes
...). The other two, as it happens, were elected representative and deputy-representative:
Louis-Séraphin du Chambge, baron de Noyelles (1732-94) who resigned
in December 1789 because of his dislike of the Revolution, and his replacement
Pierre-Joseph du Chambge, seigneur d'Elbecq (1733-93), an army officer
who was a strong supporter of the Revolution (he resumed active service
in 1792 and was sent to the Pyrenees front where he died of natural death).

The Liessart branch, settled in Lille, continued to use the title of
chevalier, and the death certificate of one of them, dated 1825, also uses
the title. The problem that the letters patent of 1673 were not explicit
about the mode of transmission. So, in 1852, when they tried to change
the spelling of their name from Duchambge to Du Chambge de Liessart and
insert the title of "chevalier" in the Etat civil, they failed in the civil
courts (they did get the spelling change). Hence their recourse to the
Conseil du sceau, who confirmed their hereditary title of chevalier by
decree of 25 Jun 1860 (case reported in Recueil Sirey 1852, part
2, p. 102).

There are other examples of surviving hereditary titles of chevalier.
Perusing Woëlmont de Brumagne's volumes on La noblesse subsistante,
one finds a grant of lettres de chevalerie to the family de Perrey
in Franche-Comté, in 1720. The other examples are all from
Artois, Flanders and Hainaut, which can be checked in Séréville
and Saint-Simon (those missing in the latter are marked "extinct?"):

Several French noble families were listed as having received the title
of chevalier from the Habsburg rulers of the Low Countries, but with no
indication of a confirmation by French kings. If Janssens is to be
believed, none of those grants could have been hereditary, so the titles
(absent a French grant) are doubtful.

Sars: chevalier héréditaire, LP of 22 Jul 1691 (Woëlmont)
or 1671 (Séréville and Saint-Simon) (not in Janssens, who
only has letters of ennoblement 24 Dec 1656; S and S-S claim these were
cancelled at the grantee's request)

"Chevalier" under Napoleon

Under Napoleon, "chevalier" became a full-fledged title of nobility. It
was originally bound with the Legion of Honor, and the legislation that
governed it was complex and confusing. There are 5 different ways
in which a chevalier could be created.

Under Napoleon, a member of the Legion of Honor (created in 1802) was a
légionnaire, not a chevalier. However, when Napoleon
created titles of Nobility by the decree of 1 March 1808, he gave the title
of "chevalier de l'Empire" ad personam to all members of the Legion of
Honor without any formality (art. 11). Anyone one of them could style himself
"chevalier N" or "N, chevalier de l'Empire." Furthermore (art. 12),
those who could prove they had at least 3000F of revenues (no majorat was
required) could receive letters patent that made the title "transmissible",
that is, conditionally hereditary: a decree of confirmation was required
at each generation, failing which the title was not transmitted (the requirement
was not vacuous, as there is a known example of a confirmation refused).
It was thus not purely hereditary. It passed by male primogeniture to legitimate
or adoptive descent in male line.

This restriction was weakened by a decree of 3 March 1810 which declared
that the confirmation was required only of heirs of the original grantee
up to the 3d generation (unless they happened to be members of the Legion
of Honor), but that after 3 such confirmations, no further confirmations
would be necessary, and the title became purely hereditary. This implied
that if the original grantee was succeeded by a son and a grandson who
were also members of the L of H (and thus did not need confirmation) the
title was automatically hereditary starting with the 4th generation.

1088 such letters patent were issued.

For a brief period, from September 1809 to May 1810, several members of
the Legion who were also recipients of large endowments (dotations)
were assimilated to holders of titles with majorats; in such cases (116
titles in all), the title of chevalier was hereditary from the moment of
issue of letters patent, without any further confirmation needed. From
May 1810, all letters patent conferring the transmissible title of chevalier
included a clause requiring 3 successive confirmations before it became
hereditary.

From April 1810 to 1814, Napoleon also created motu proprio (on
the basis of art. 13 of the decree of 1 March 1808) 240 titles, for whom
the income minimum requirement was waved, at least for the grantee.
They were subject to the 3-confirmations requirement.

Members of the Order of the Reunion, created in 1811, were given the same
rights to the title of chevalier by decree of 12 March 1813 (50 cases).
They were subject to the 3-confirmations requirement.

A decree of 26 Aug 1811 allowed members of nobility in annexed territories
to sollicit titles of nobility; as a result, 8 titles of knights were created.
They were subject to the 3-confirmations requirement.

All told, 1511 letters patent were issued.

"Chevalier" under the Restoration and after

The earlier legislation was not abrogated, but it ceased to be used (only
one case of a 2d generation confirmation under the Napoleonic statutes,
case 2 above, is known under the Restoration). Instead,
an ordonnance of 8 Oct 1814 allowed for the further issue of letters patent,
but at the king's pleasure only, conferring the title of knight ad personam
to members of the Legion of Honor (or of the order of Saint-Louis); also,
it stated that when a man, a son, and a grandson had been members of the
Legion (or Saint-Louis) and had received the title of "chevalier",
the grandson was automatically noble and transmitted his nobility to all
his male-line descendants; it also appears that the title of chevalier
became hereditary (not explicitly stated in the ordonnance itself, but
implied by the accompanying schedule of fees). The Conseil du sceau
took the view that the title descended by male primogeniture.

In all, the king granted 104 new titles of chevalier to members of the
Legion of Honor, 4 to members of the order of Saint-Louis, and 5 titles
to 2d generation members of the Legion of Honor. He also granted
144 titles to members of the Legion of Honor who had already received the
title under Napoleon, at their request.

Under the July monarchy (1830-48), the minimum income requirements became
moot; no further grants of 1st-generation chevaliers were made in France
after 1830. A total of 5 2d-generation confirmations were made.
Under the Second Empire (1852-70) 24 confirmations were made, variously
under the Napoleonic statutes or under the ordonnance of 1814. One
unique case is that of Chambge de Liessart, discussed
above. After 1870, only two confirmations have been made, including
the only known case of a 3d generation confirmation under the statute of
1814 (Flury-Hérard, granted 30 Jan 1811, confrimed 25 Nov 1814,
23 May 1866, 25 Sept. 1874): this would be the only fully hereditary title
of chevalier surviving in France, at least under the post-1808 statutes.

According to Texier, there are still potential hereditary knights: descendants
of the grantees of 1702, members of the L of H who received letters patent
and were succeeded by 2 generations of members of the L of H (he cites
the example of the Vignon family), and descendants of the 116 grantees
of hereditary titles between 1809 and 1810.